Reviews in chronological order (Total 2 reviews)

Submitted by Adam Grimsley on 26/01/2002 14:03

This is a gripping retelling of the events that surrounded the tragic march, yet I cannot help but feel rather uneasy about the way the film seeks to mimic a documentary format; this film endeavours to be a drama and a documentary and subsequently fails to be either. Nesbitt is simpathetic yet Piggott-Smith's character only provides us with a one dimensional ignorant upper classs commander.
I felt I needed more.

Submitted by Audrey O' Hagan on 27/01/2002 17:56

Bloody Sunday
This emotive recreation of Bloody Sunday, about the massacre of January 1972 in Northern Ireland, has predictably whipped up a storm of protest for its allegedly partisan politics and factual inaccuracies. As a piece of drama, however, it works remarkably well, bringing the chaos and carnage of that tragedy inflicted day to life while boasting a towering performance from James Nesbitt as real-life civil rights leader Ivan Cooper.
Based on the testimonies from both soldiers and marchers, as published in Don Mullan's book "Eyewitness Bloody Sunday", Paul Greengrass' film uses controversy in attempt to convey the emotion of the moment. Here Cooper, a middle-class Protestant and newly elected MP, has called for a peaceful protest march against the anti-Catholic bias in the electoral, penal, and housing systems. But while he has managed to contain unruly elements on both sides of the religious divide, he has not reckoned with Major General Ford (Pigott-Smith) and high-ranking elements within the British establishment, who used the occasion to regain control of what they perceived to be a civil upraising.
What follows is a traumatic reconstruction of how the peaceful protest was transformed into what could only be described as a massacre of unarmed civilians, which left 14 people dead, many more injured, and a city scarred forever.
With the Saville Inquiry far from reaching a verdict, there isn't much chance of Greengrass, Jimmy McGovern, or anyone else telling the whole story of what actually happened on that sorrowful day in a manner that is deemed to be fair, just and accurate to all those that will view it.
But "Bloody Sunday" goes some way towards explaining how the tragedy occurred and its enduring legacy today.